🥘 Ingredients

3 or 4 lbs. of veal cutlets, a few slices of bacon or ham, seasoning of pepper, salt, nutmeg, and allspice, forcemeat No. 415, 2 lbs. of hot-water paste No. 1217, 1/2 pint of good strong gravy.

👨‍🍳 Method

To raise the crust for a pie with the hands is a very difficult task, and can only be accomplished by skilled and experienced cooks. The process should be seen to be satisfactorily learnt, and plenty of practice given to the making of raised pies, as by that means only will success be insured. Make a hot-water paste by recipe No. 1217, and from the mass raise the pie with the hands; if this cannot be accomplished, cut out pieces for the top and bottom, and a long piece for the sides; fasten the bottom and side-piece together by means of egg, and pinch the edges well together; then line the pie with forcemeat made by recipe No. 415, put in a layer of veal, and a plentiful seasoning of salt, pepper, nutmeg, and allspice, as, let it be remembered, these pies taste very insipid unless highly seasoned. Over the seasoning place a layer of sliced bacon or cooked ham, and then a layer of forcemeat, veal seasoning, and bacon, and so on until the meat rises to about an inch above the paste; taking care to finish with a layer of forcemeat, to fill all the cavities of the pie, and to lay in the meat firmly and compactly. Brush the top edge of the pie with beaten egg, put on the cover, press the edges, and pinch them round with paste-pincers. Make a hole in the middle of the lid, and ornament the pie with leaves, which should be stuck on with the white of an egg; then brush it all over with the beaten yolk of an egg, and bake the pie in an oven with a soaking heat from 3 to 4 hours. To ascertain when it is done, run a sharp-pointed knife or skewer through the hole at the top into the middle of the pie, and if the meat feels tender, it is sufficiently baked. Have ready about 1/2 pint of very strong gravy, pour it through a funnel into the hole at the top, stop up the hole with a small leaf of baked paste, and put the pie away until wanted for use. Should it acquire too much colour in the baking, cover it with white paper, as the crust should not in the least degree be burnt. Mushrooms, truffles, and many other ingredients, may be added to enrich the flavour of these pies, and the very fleshy parts of the meat may be larded. These pies are more frequently served cold than hot, and form excellent dishes for cold suppers or breakfasts. The cover of the pie is sometimes carefully removed, leaving the perfect edges, and the top decorated with square pieces of very bright aspic jelly: this has an exceedingly pretty effect.

📜 From Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management (1861). Public domain.